Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or any of the stuff J.K. Rowling created.

Chapter Twenty-six

New Year's Eve (Part One)

"Erm…James? Why's your mum going on a cleaning-frenzy?"

James lifted his plate up as his mum, once again, ran a sponge over the countertops. He rolled his eyes, and I wasn't sure if it was directed at me or his mother.

"Of course you wouldn't know," he said, sighing as he put his plate and fork down. "Today's New Year's Eve, therefore tonight's New Year's."

I blinked at him, then turned to Sirius. "Eh?"

"The marking of a new year," he said through a full mouth of food, which he continued shoveling full.

I scrunched up my nose in distaste; boys were gross. "And the importance of that is…?"

"It's just the new year, Nik. We celebrate it. Everyone around the world does. It's tradition," James explained. "And we always go to a New Year's Eve party, and this year happens to be our turn to host it, so mum's nervous about living up to past standards."

"Ooohhh…"

"Yeeaahh…" James said, mocking my tone. "Now if you'll excuse us, we've got some food to eat."

"Fine," I snapped, jumping down from the high bar stools. I walked outside to the garden area and found Mr. Potter crouched there, sorting through what I assumed were decorations.

"Hi."

"Hi," he replied, looking up from the massive tangled mess. "What'cha need?"

"Nothin'. Just wonderin' if you needed any help, is all. Looks like you're having a hard time."

"I'm not sure you can help with this; two people just might make a bigger mess. This stuff's been up in the attic for years," he said, leaning back on the balls of his feet.

"Why not just use magic?" To me, that seemed like the most logical thing to do.

Mr. Potter shrugged. "Joyce wants us setting an 'example' for James, so no magic in the house while he's around til he's seventeen."

I snorted. "Well I never agreed to such a thing. Mind your fingers."

Before he could protest, I focused on the pile in front of me, and in my mind I saw everything sort themselves out, laying side by side on the ground in neat piles according to what they were. As I was thinking it, the scene in my head became reality, playing out in front of me. Within seconds, the pile that would take an hour to organize was as good as new.

He shook his head at me. "You probably shouldn't have done that."

I looked around me, then shrugged. "Oh well. What're they gonna do? Arrest me?"

"Yes," he said in a dead serious voice, "that's exactly what they'll do."

"Oh." There was silence, then I said, "So…can I help hang anything?"

"Mmm…well—"

"Nike!" Mrs. Potter called. "Could you come help me for a minute?"

"You lost your chance!" I smiled at Mr. Potter than ran into the house towards the back kitchen.

"Yes ma'am?" I asked her, coming to a halt at the counter, noticing, with relief, that Sirius and James had left.

"D'you think you could finish cooking for me while I finish cleaning and start decorating inside?"

"Me? Cook?" I sputtered. "Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Sure! Why not? Every girl knows how to cook!"

"Well, not every…"

"And I understand that you had to cook in detention once."

"Well…no. It was more of cleaning—"

"Oh. You want Sirius' help, huh? I'll just call him in here and—"

"No! No. I'll do it. Just, please, please keep them away. They're being weird today."

She grinned in one that matched James' mischievous one. "Alright. I have a list of stuff that needs to be finished, so if you could do that for me, that'd be wonderful." Then she left through the swinging doors.

I went to the list hung on the wall and groaned at the long list. Mrs. Potter had lied to me; I did have to cook something. I didn't have to finish up anything, oh no, I just had to cook all the desserts.

I stomped over to the cupboards and flung them open, grabbing the flour and sugar. I set them on the counter, and went to get a bowl. I was going to start with the easiest sounding one; cookies. Following the directions from the cookbook she had laid out, I gathered up the rest of the ingredients.

Once I had them all laid out, I started to combine the stuff in the bowl, hoping that it wasn't a bad thing if you had egg shells in the mixture. I stirred the mixture sloppily, trying to keep it in the small bowl, which happened to be the only one I could find. I went to reach for the glass of water I'd put on the counter, but I wasn't watching and I accidently knocked it and the flour off the counter. It landed with a loud crash and a huge puff of flour rose up from the ground, filling the area.

I coughed, inhaling the stuff and tried to clear the air with my hand, but succeeded in making a bigger mess because I knocked the mixture I'd just stirred off the counter. There was another loud crash, causing me to jump.

Wincing, I made my way for the counter, trying to find a rag that I knew had been there. But I guess I was moving too quickly, because I slipped on the various liquids on the floor and fell backwards, landing on my back, causing more flour to rise up in the air.

Red-hot anger swelled up inside me. I hated cooking!

I heard the door open, and footsteps stop.

"What the hell happened in here?" came Sirius' voice.

"Nike?" James said in a hesitant voice. "Are you in here?"

"No," I said dryly. "This mess made itself and I'm just an innocent bystander who happens to be on her ass."

"Mess is an understatement," Sirius said, laughing.

"Don't you dare laugh Sirius Black!" I snapped.

"Where are you?" James asked.

"Right here," I said, standing up, peering through the haze at them. I turned to the sink and, wouldn't you know it, slipped and fell on my butt.

"Damn it all!" I yelled. Both boys had the nerve to burst out laughing at me. I got on my hands and knees and slowly half-crawled and half-slid over to them, ignoring the shards of glass that stuck in my hands, feet, and knees.

"You guys are bastards," I hissed, grabbing their legs to help myself up off the floor. I grasped their arms to get on my slippery feet, but like I noted, my feet were slippery, and I fell again, bringing the boys down with me.

"Get off me, Sirius!" I yelled.

"James! Get off us!" Sirius yelled at James.

"I'm trying, but your legs—"

"Get your hands off my legs, James! That's weird!"

"Well then you get your legs off me because until then I can't move," James said in an irritated voice.

Sirius huffed and turned around, putting his arms on my chest as he did so. "I—"

"You best remove your arms off me right now Sirius Black before I break them," I growled.

He looked back at me and his eyes widened. "I'm sorry I—"

There was a sudden movement and Sirius was thrown forward, squishing me even more, his face becoming buried and his hands getting tangled in my already messy hair.

"There. Much better," James said. He uttered a strangled laugh when, I'm assuming, he saw us. I started to punch Sirius.

"Get. Off. Me!" I snarled. He moved, but his fingers were still stuck in my hair.

"Gah!" he exclaimed. "Your hair's so tangled! I can't get my fingers out! We're gonna have to cut it off."

James snickered, and we both turned to glare at him, yelling, "SHUT-UP!" Just then there was a knock on the door.

"Crap!" Sirius said. "People are here!"

"What?" I said. "But I thought you had at least an hour…"

"Nike! You've been in here for an hour!"

"Seriously? There's no way!"

"Yeah. We were coming in to see how you were doing and tell you to go get changed," James said, helping us to our feet, which was painful to my poor hair because of the big oaf attached to it.

"What's wrong with how I'm dressed?" I demanded, and we all looked down and examined me, and let's just say I looked…interesting. A combination of flour, water, eggs, and oil covered every inch of my body and clothes, shards of glass from the water glass and bowl were also stuck in my skin, clothes, and hair, and my hair was a complete rats' nest fit with horrible tangles, the cooking crap, and Sirius' freakin' fingers.

"Okay. Well…maybe I've seen better days, but…"

James snorted. "C'mon. Let's get you up stairs so you can wash up. Hopefully we can sneak past people." He laughed at a thought. "What a great first impression this would make!"

"First impression? What d'you mean?"

"You're meeting everyone's parents. Well…hopefully. If the adults'll let us be around them," James said, poking his head out the door.

"No. No, I'm not going to meet them tonight! I haven't had time to prepare myself! I'm gonna say something stupid and make a fool of myself and they'll hate me. Not gonna happen tonight, James!" I said breathlessly.

"Alright! Coast is clear! C'mon!" James whispered, and Sirius and I, moving as best as we could with him not yanking my hair out. We made it to the stairs unnoticed, but my luck couldn't possibly have lasted much longer than that.

"James!" Lily called, and the stupid boy turned around with a wide smile on his face, holding up progress.

"Hi Lily," he said in a shy voice. Sirius rolled his eyes and gagged.

"Mum, dad, this is…oh Merlin! What the heck happened to you, Nike?" Lily demanded.

"Damn," Sirius and I muttered at the exact same time under our breaths. Great first impression, alright.

I slowly turned around, and hissed when Sirius wouldn't turn around, yanking on my hair I swung a fist wildly at him and missed, but the moron just yanked on my hair even harder.

"Hey Lil!" I said, trying to sound enthusiastic. "Fancy seeing you here!"

She was looking at me with a horrified look. "Yeah…erm…"

I sighed. "Mrs. Potter had me cooking. And these two gits got in my way, which is why his bloody fingers are stuck in my hair."

Mrs. Evans laughed, bringing my attention to her. "You have talent, Miss Nike. I have never in my life seen someone come out of a kitchen looking like that."

I glanced at Lily, then smiled slightly. "Talent at messing up, yes. It's a terrible gift."

Mrs. Evans held out her hand, but I hesitated to shake it. "I, um, well…" I held up my hands.

She smiled and shook my hand anyways. "It's nice to finally meet you. I'm Lisa, and this is John, my husband." I looked over at Lily's dad, and saw him eying James, who looked very uncomfortable but didn't look away. Mrs. Evans sighed and elbowed Mr. Evans.

His eyes snapped away from James and to his wife, who nodded her head in my direction and mutter, "Don't be rude. Say hello to Lily's best friend."

He stared at me hard, then smirked. "Cooking isn't your specialty, is it?"

"Yeah…no."

"Mine either," he agreed, holding out his hand, which I promptly shook. "As Lisa already said, I'm John, Lily's father."

"Pleased to meet you."

"Now. Are you being tormented by that young man? I'd be happy to break his fingers off if he's bothering you or trying to—"

"Dad!" Lily exclaimed while Mrs. Evans said sharply,

"John!"

"What?" he asked earnestly. Sirius turned around, finally releasing the tension on my hair.

"Who are you?" Mr. Evans asked him.

"Sirius Black, sir," he said emotionlessly.

"Oh. Him." Mr. Evans didn't look to happy to hear that name. I raised an eyebrow at Lily, who shrugged helplessly, mouthing, "They know about his family. The Daily Prophet…"

I coughed into my arm. "Well…it's a pleasure to meet you guys. I'll be more presentable in a few minutes, so…" I turned to Lily and James. "I'll catch up with you guys then."

Lily nodded, leading James and her parents away down the hall. Sirius glanced at me.

"Not so much of a hotshot to adults, are ya?" I asked, smirking.

"Oh shut-up," he snapped, walking up the stairs, dragging me by my hair.

"Ow, ow, ow, you bast—"

"Sirius!" a woman's voice yelled gleefully.

"Ah hell. How many people am I gonna meet looking like this?" I hissed at him. But his eyes had brightened and he turned around, dragging me down the stairs.

"Andromeda!" he said. "Where's Uncle Alphard?"

"I'm afraid he couldn't make it this time. But it's good to see my favorite cousin," she said, walking up the last few stairs, giving him a tight hug.

"OW!" I yelled, when he attempted to hug her back, yanking my hair even farther.

Andromeda, a tall, young woman with the familiar black hair and stormy grey eyes, pulled back and smiled at me. "You must be Nike."

"Yeah," I said, not in the best of moods. "That'd be me." I glared at Sirius. "And I'm about to be bald, so get a good last look at the wonderful stuff on top of my head, because it's about to be gone."

She laughed. "Tonks described you exactly right." My eyes widened, and I looked her over again. She did look like Tonks, what with her figure and height.

"Y-you're Tonks' mom? But you're…you're so young!"

Andromeda laughed again. "Thanks. I know I'm much younger than the rest of the parents that have teenagers, but I think Teddy and I manage fairly well."

"Oh! I didn't mean—"

"I know. Here. Let me help with that issue before there's only two good Blacks left in the world." She took her wand out and pointed it at my hair, uttered a spell, and Sirius' fingers were out of my hair, and my hair was back to normal, even brushed.

"Thanks," Sirius and I said at the same time.

"Don't mention it," she said. "Now go upstairs and fix yourself up before the rest of the guests arrive. We're just the early-birds."

Nodding to her, I ran up the stairs, not being able to wash away all the humiliation.

A/N: Haha yeah…stupid? Perhaps. But this just shows how, erm, talented Nike is. So, if you thought it was stupid, okay. But remember, not everybody can cook, and there ARE danger-prone people out there (I'm one of them!) so that's just my opinion.

Also, not much descriptions of parents and she doesn't really get to judge their characters very much, but there'll be a later time for that. And I found no names on Lily's parents, so I found some random, common names. If none of you like that, oh well. If you can actually find that they DID have names, please let me know so I can change that! And I decided to make Lily's dad a dad who, like most dads of teenager girls, doesn't like boys that hang out with their daughters, and especially not their boyfriends (and even more so, their first boyfriend). So, I should have fun with that, but poor James...

Alrighty! So the sooner I get reviews, the sooner we can see part two of New Year's and how horrible (oops! Did I say horrible? I meant to say fun…) that will turn out to be!

So, R&R guys! Thanks!

Nike